Symbiosis
by cutecarnivore
Summary: Set during and after the events of half-life two and intertwining with the little known horror game .flow, Symbiosis follows the story of a young member of the resistance and the mysterious white-haired girl she happens upon one day, wasting away from a terrible disease and haunted by her own dreams, as they attempt to escape city 17 and survive in the devastated wilderness
1. Chapter 1

Chapter 1:Isolation

[Subject:Sabitsuki (Surname redacted)]

I was born in Japan, but I remember little of it. I was transferred to Europe as a young child. From what I've heard, most people are relocated to different locations every few years at least, but it seems to be more like every few months people come and go, except for me. I stay here, in city 17. I don't know much about this place-we're in Europe, I think, but no European government controls us. The combine is the closest thing we have to a government, but I don't know much about them, either, beyond what I've learned from Dr. Breens broadcasts, and the little contact I've had with them. For as long as I can remember, I've stayed in my bedroom under direct orders from them. As per there instructions, I am to8 make a comprehensive record of my dreams each day on the computer provided. In return, I am provided food, protection, and most importantly, medicine. In my early years, I caught a disease known simply as "rust". Its a terrible affliction that causes my skin to become red and inflamed, making nearly every movement painful, which is then followed by vomiting up this horrible, vicious red substance, which tastes and smells like rotten meat. If left untreated long enough, this liquid will leak from everywhere in my body-tear ducts, my nose, my ears-you get the picture. And yet all of this pales in comparison to the vicious hallucinations it inflicts, which are too painful for me to recount now. Moreover, the medicine for such a disease is difficult and costly to manufacture, which is how the Combine has secured my cooperation. My medicine is not without its side-effects, however, and can account for much of my memory loss. As such, it is as though this room is my entire world. I'm fine with this, as the rest of the world is right fucked, from what I've seen out my windows and off my balcony.

My day starts as many others before, as I rise slowly from bed, my bones creaking in protest of my sudden movements. After a nice stretch and a yawn, I roll out of bed. I tend to sleep in my clothes, so I'm ready for the day with limited preparation. I eat my wheat meal as I fire up the ancient computer, and it makes several angry beeps before the monitor flicks on with a staticy whine. It isn't long before I'm recording everything that's happened to me over the night. Tonight was relatively tame, actually. As always, I woke up in my room, but it was different. Decayed would be a good way to sum it all up. Then, I would proceed to what I call the Nexus-an odd, flat black plane crisscrossed by white lines nearly randomly. From there, the dream could go any number of ways. In this case, I ended up in a forest. Most every tree was dead, and I wandered about for a few hours, before happening upon a small cabin. Inside this cabin, I met an old woman. She was obviously a witch, and fit every stereotype as such. She gave me a broom, which, true to folklore, allowed me to fly. I flew far, exploring the vast marshlands my mind crafted for me, dotted here and there with rotting houses, strange monoliths of brick and stone that only give a vague hint anyone had lived there. Right around then was when I woke up. Nothing traumatic, which is nice, if rare. Not long after I'm done, My overseer pops in. first in the door are his Civil protection lackeys. He's always accompanied by at least three of them, big, scary guys with gas masks and guns, who look at you in such a clinical, emotionless way its nearly unnerving, but not as bad as the good doctor himself. 'creep' does not even begin to summarize the man. He's tall, even by my standards, towering over my 6 ½ foot frame as he calmly takes his data and leaves, his shaved head augumented with several strange metal protrusions all over his cranium. He comes without saying a word, and leaves without saying a word. That's pretty much it for my day, after that, with not much else to do. I have hobbies-I used to read, before they began burning books. Nowadays I simply end up drawing an awful lot, and I'm getting pretty good, too. Its just that I often find my drawings often drift towards the subject matter of my dreams, which as I've stated before I have no intention to revisit. Such is a normal day-it was 3 o'clock in the afternoon exactly when things deviated from such norms. Deep in thought as I examined a recent drawing of a cactus, I was startled by a sharp thudding on the glass doors to my balcony. A short girl in tattered clothing was trying to get my attention, knocking frantically but saying something I couldn't hear. On instinct, I let her in, and she dashed inside, ducking under my table as a city scanner floated by with no explanation, except several panicked expletives mumbled under her breath. Once the synth had passed, She crawled from her hiding place, and attempted a proper introduction.

"Er, good evening, miss. You really saved my ass just now. Names Tetra, Tetra Cubbage. nice to meet you."

She says, extending her hand out in my direction. I simply looked at it for a few seconds.

"You, uh...you shake my hand now."

"What?"

I replied as I examined the exasperated girl. She was a little on the short side, with large aviators goggles resting above ratty brown hair worn long past her shoulders. She was dressed different from the usual blue uniforms of most citizens, instead wearing a large canvas coat with many pockets over some scavenged clothes. In her coat, I caught the telltale glint of gun metal, but I couldn't be sure if she was, in fact, armed.

"You grab my hand, and you move it up and down. Its how you say hi to someone for the first time."

She instructed plainly, with no frustration, just a little confusion. I did as she instructed, and she was quite pleased.

"You have a name?"

She asked as the handshake ended. I shrugged and told her;

"Sabitsuki. I think."

"That's...That's a pretty name, actually."

She says, stepping back from me.

"Um...I should probably go, now. I wouldn't want you to get in trouble..."

"In trouble? For what?"

"Its a long story."

She says, opening the door and turning her back to me.

"Wait-I never get to talk to anyone, please don't go quite yet."

I say, a pleading note to my voice. She turns around, and sighs.

"I'm sorry, but the risk is to great right now...But, I guess I can come back later, after the heat has died down, if you really want."

And with that, she jumped off my balcony. I nearly screamed, certain she would plunge to her death, but she managed to jump across the street and on to the roof of a lower building, landing with a roll and looking back up at me, waving once before darting off.

Several hours passed, But Tetra kept good on her promise. Just as I finished dinner-wheat meal again, its the only damn thing they ever feed us- I heard her tapping faintly on my balcony door, a lot calmer than last time. I obliged and opened the door for her, and she stepped inside. I noticed she had a bit of a deft grace to her movements when she wasn't in a panicked state, She looked around my small room, seeming as though she was looking for something, before she turned to greet me again, insisting on another handshake, which I (Uncomfortably) went with.

"So, um...you wanted to see me again. Whats your message?"

"My what now?"

"Message. I thought you wanted me to relate a message to someone. Its kind of what I do."

She says, seeming a little mixed up. I shift uncomfortable as I explain.

"I just, um...wanted to talk."

"Your serious?"

"...Yeah."

There's a couple of uncomfortable seconds between us, before she shrugs and smiles.

"no harm in it, I guess, and I don't have anything better to do. Things are kind of slow."

She takes a seat on the couch, and I shift around on my bed to face her. The conversation is slow going and more than a little awkward, her being a stranger and I being a bit "Out-of-practice" when it came to conversation with real people. Eventually, I inquire about the strange armband she wears.

"Whats that?"

I ask, gesturing to the odd symbol, which puts me in mind of an oddly written, unfinished A.

"Oh, this?"

She says, bringing her arm up and pointing at the orange letter.

"Its a Greek letter, called a Lambda."

"What does it mean?"

"It has some kind of scientific interpretation, but to me, its something far bigger."

Tetra casts a suspicious eye across my room, before leaning in towards me, nearly whispering.

"Its the Insignia of the resistance. I'm a freedom fighter."

"Your...huh?"

"resistance. You don't know about the Lambda resistance?"

I shrug, and she seems absolutely mystified.

"Wow, I'd like to think we were at least an urban legend at this point. Listen, this stays between you and me, you understand that right?"

"Right."

"And you never tell anyone you met me, for your safety."

"Okay, I guess. So what are you guys trying to do that's so important?"

She gets up, and walks to the window, pointing to the monolithic structure nestled in the center of the city-The citadel.

"You know the Combine, I'm sure."

"Yeah, you could say that."

"They've enslaved our planet, killed millions in the seven hours war and now there draining our planet-our home-dry, controlling our minds and bodies as that traitor Breen rules over us."

She isn't facing me, any more, and seems to talking to either her own reflection or the tower itself.

"I won't take that lying down, and neither will my comrades. One of these days, we're going to exterminate all of those bastards."

She looks out the window for a second longer, before taking in a deep breath and turning to me.

"So yeah. That's whats so important. You seem strong-why don't you join us? It'd be a better life than losing your mind in here."

I'm a bit taken aback by all of this, and while I trust this strange girl, I don't want to go get caught up in some war. I shake my head.

"I'm sorry. I'm not fighting material."

"I understand. Not everyone is. But just in case-if they ever talk about shipping you to a place known as Nova Prospekt, you run for it, stick to the rooftops and look for the Lambda. Find your ways to the Canal-there's a group there known as the railroad who help refugee's out of the city."

She says, going over the information again to make sure I remember. While the thought of escape is a tempting one-my fear far outweighs it. I think of the overseer's face staring down at me, flanked by officers, and my blood runs cold. I try to think of another subject, but the Combine is the elephant in the room-every aspect of our lives is dictated by them. It quickly becomes a little uncomfortable again, but we still end up talking and just hanging out for a little while. It feels bizarre, how normal she treats me, a truly alien feeling to me. She jokes around with me a bit, tries to get to know me. To my surprise, she actually does make me laugh a few times. I forgot what my own laugh sounded like. Even though we must've talked for hours, it still felt to soon when it was time for her to leave.

"Well, I guess I have to bid you good evening."

She says, waving slightly as she opens the balcony door.

"I promise I'll come back sometime."

And with that, I say my goodbye and send her off. I...I think she counts as a friend, so I got that going for me, which is pretty cool. I look at the clock-its a quarter to eleven. If I don't get to sleep soon, I won't have an entry for the overseer.

The last time that happened, he extracted the entry himself.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2: Escape  
[Subject: Tetra Cubbage (Related to previous subject, Odessa Cubbage.)

Weeks passed after I met Sabitsuki, the strange, white haired girl locked away in her room. I visited her every few days, whenever there was a break in the work-I wasn't really part of the resistance _per se,_ you see. I was a messenger, and only a messenger. It wasn't much, but it was all I was allowed to do. My father, Odessa, is a fairly important leader of the resistance forces. Seeing as the Combine are kind of, you know, douchebags, I was pretty damn antsy to join the resistance myself and fight the good fight. My dad, however...he's kind of protective. He couldn't bear the thought of his little girl marching in to do battle with alien horrors, but complete strangers with family and friends were totally fine to send into the battle field. Yeah, never really made sense to me, and it kind of ground my gears getting kept off the frontline like that, but being a messenger in City 17 is important too, I guess. Most of what I do is warning those who've been singled out by the overwatch for punishment so they can flee the city. Currently, I was about to get up and start my rounds, but when I entered the common room of our little safe-house, Everyone was huddled up to a small TV. The picture was quite grainy, and I had a hard time making out what it was-it was some kind of news report-some nutter had broken into to Prospekt, and- _wait a second,_ I thought to myself, _Is that...Is that Gordon Freeman?_ According to the news reporter, yes it was, but not our Freeman-he went on to list his many acts of terrorism and mass-murder. All Combine lies.

"The Freeman has returned. The Time of reckoning has come."

A vortigaunt said, gazing intently at the screen. Silently, all of us nodded. Quickly, we filed into our makeshift armory and began grabbing a multitude of weaponry-except for me. My path was blocked by an all-too familiar, large figure.

"Dad,"

I complained, pushing past him

"This is the final push-I have to fight. We all do."

"No, Tetra."

He said, his powerful hands forcing me back away as he instructed me to leave the city at once, as fast as possible.

"Dad, I can fight, I swear"

"I said no, your still too young."

"Says who? I can fire a gun and run messages just fine, and its just as dangerous."

"Goddammit Tetra, NO!"

He says, nearly yelling at me. I realize there's no way around it, I'm going to have to turn tail and run,  
like it or not. Wordlessly, I turn away from Odessa, and begin to trek up to the rooftop, where I guess I belong.

Escaping on foot, even taking the rooftops, would be quite the endeavor, taking quite a bit of time to pull off. I ran for hours, only stopping to take small breaks and relay what intel I could by radio. I was about to make a break for the city walls, which were now in my sight, when I looked over. Some strange system of fate or chance had brought me to the building adjacent to the one Sabitsuki occupied. I could see her in the window, struggling-a trio of combine soldiers were restraining her, attempting to take her somewhere. I didn't hesitate-the Combine would doubtlessly do horrible things to her, and although we barely knew each other, I came to consider her a...friend. I ran to the edge of the roof adjacent, and threw myself of the edge, barreling through the window and right into a CP unit, rendering him unconscious with a kick to the helmet while I-in the same motion, mind you-fired my revolver, striking another officer in the chest. As I regained my balance, the third rushed me from behind, lashing against my back with his stunstick, sending a sickening electric shock up and down my spine, into my ribcage. I fell to the floor wincing in pain, and preparing for a second blow that would never come. Suddenly, I heard a sharp metal clang, and a heavy thud. When I opened my eyes, Sabitsuki was standing over me with a length of lead pipe in her hands, the CP unit lying crumpled on the other side of the room, sent flying by the sheer force of her blow.

"Tetra? Whats going on-"

"There's no time to explain, Sabitsuki, we've got to leave, now!"

I say, checking the hallway outside for any other combatants. Thankfully, the stairwell seemed clear. Wordlessly, she nods and follows me down the stairs, out on to the streets, wincing a little at the sunlight. We begin running up the street as I hear the familiar hum of a Strider behind us, its heavy footfalls echoing through the buildings as we fled from it, its pulse-machine gun plinking away at us, tearing holes in the concrete and metal around us. As we turn a corner, I see a manhole, and rush to it, trying to get it open before the giant creature can catch up. I struggle with it, but it won't budge. Sabitsuki catches up, however, and pries the manhole off with little effort, holding it open for me to drop down before she closes it as she descends. The whole section of sewer system around us seemed to shake, dust coming down from the ceiling as the confused strider clambered about above. Sabitsuki and I both decided to catch our breath, panting heavily from our mad dash across the surface.

"We're not safe yet, are we?"  
She asks, looking at me with panic in her eyes.

"We're more safe than we were a minute ago, which is nice. Besides..."

I reach around to my backpack and pull out a map of the sewers, which is marked in several different colors for different routes out of the city and different supply caches-you get the idea.

"This was part of the plan."

I say, trying to be reassuring, but Sabitsuki looks about ready to throw up. I urge her to follow me, but try to take it easy on her-despite her prodigious strength, she seemed to tire quite quickly, lacking stamina.

Okay, this is kind of an embarrassing part of the story. You know those Barnacle things that hang around in damp, dark places-the little creatures with the sticky tongue that hangs low to catch prey and pull it up to their maw, that any resistance member worth her salt would be able to immediately spot and walk around with little trouble?

Yeah. Those barnacles.

So as Sabitsuki and I wandered through the tunnel, I let my mind wander for just a second, and wouldn't you know it, walked right into one of the gooey bastards. It starts dragging me up to nom on my face, and I panic, and begin losing my shit, screaming and flailing around-as well as dropping my gun. Thankfully, though, Sabitsuki acted quickly, grabbing me by the arms and yanking me from the creatures grasp. It took me a second to calm down, but I attempted to regain my composure swiftly enough as to not completely embarrass myself. I like to think the two of us silently agreed to never talk about it ever again and continued our weary trek.

It wasn't long before we ran into more of the combine, of course, their splashes easily audible from far away-I guess when you've got that many guns, stealth doesn't matter. I pulled Sabitsuki down and behind a fallen pillar with me, my gun in hand in case things got ugly. I could hear them, but it was hard to understand them through their distorted transmissions. I could vaguely make out that they were withdrawing from the sewers, something about letting the professional come down instead-whatever that meant, it didn't sound very fun at all. They left promptly, without noticing the two of us, thankfully, but the forbidding mention of a professional hung heavy in the back of my head.

"Stop here."

Sabitsuki whispered, nearly completely out of death, and looking a bit paler than usual. She bent over, inhaling heavily.

"Are you okay?"

I put a hand on her shoulder, trying to coax her along. Before she can respond, A strange sound, like someone sucking a hardboiled egg through a straw, echoes through the hall.

"Whats that?"

She asks, and I shrug, feeling worried. I will her to hurry up so we can get out of this creepy place, but its far to late-we've been found. The breathing gets closer, the air shimmering in the vague shape of something humanoid in my flashlight beam, the distortion darting towards us.

"Run!"

I yell, gripping her wrist and taking off in the opposite direction. It's catching up, I know it-I nearly had us, if not for the freak coincidence of a pipe falling loose from its bolts, falling in between us and the invisible assailant. Sensing an opportunity, I turned and fired once, striking the thing in its torso, a patch of brown discoloration appearing on its shimmering silhouette where I shot it. It stumbled back, then ran off. We needed to get above ground-quickly. I looked around with my flashlight, and thankfully, there was a stairwell into some kind of sub-basement nearby. I had Sabitsuki batter down the door, and we hurried inside and up the stairs, into some kind of basement. We blocked the way we had came with assorted debris, and gauged the situation-the basement seemed intact enough, but with things the way they were, we had no option to stick around. We climbed the stairs a second time, coming to the ground floor of a hospital.

"Jeez, this place has certainly seen some better days."

I remark, looking around at the boarded windows and door, the distant sounds of crumbling plaster and eternally dripping faucets playing an urban call-and response. My companion, however, was oddly disturbed by this place.

"I don't...I don't like it here. I can't put my finger on it, but something about this place seems scarier than the tunnels."

"Well, at least up here we can take advantage of the daylight."

I say, and I try a few non boarded doors, nearly all of them locked, but eventually one swings open, and a gangly, humanoid creature over me, looking down with passive disinterest. The oddly proportioned synthetic gestures politely that I step aside, and I do so. Sabitsuki nearly lets out another wail, but I rush over to calm her down with a cupped hand over her mouth.

"Calm down, Its only an incinerator."

"Ah, that sounds perfectly harmless."

She quips, and I shrug, looking at the incinerator itself, which has probably forgotten we exist, and marched dutifully towards whatever it was supposed to do.

"It is, actually. There made by the combine to get rid of Vermin, like headcrabs and boomers, although whenever there's a riot, they send these guys out to burn up all the corpses. But I'm not sure what one's doing here...I mean, this place doesn't look infected..."

I say, observing as it begins going from room to room, using its odd tool to burn the bodies on the gurneys inside to ash, as well as a large amount of samples. I make sure it's back is to me, and swipe a few microscope slides of some unknown reddish thing-whatever was is here, the combine has to have a reason for wanting it all to vanish.

"Come on then-lets get back on the streets. All these old buildings are giving me the creeps."

But getting out of the hospital proved difficult-as I said before, many of the doors and windows were boarded up tight. For a while, all was silent, except for the occasional crackle of flames downstairs. Then, down a hall perpendicular to us, we heard someone call out.

"You there!"

Yelled a fellow rebel, waving over at us.

"Its not safe for you he-"

He never finishes his sentence, a giant red split appearing diagonally through his torso, his lower and upper halves deciding to part ways for now. The same, ominous breathing fills the room, that shimmer in the air appearing once more before darting at us. Once more, it chases us through the halls, but Sabitsuki splits off from me, ducking into one of the rooms the incinerator went into. I yell something at her, not really bothering to make sense as I'm currently dashing away from near certain death. The chase continues as such for nearly 30 more seconds, before I feel a strong heat at my back. Turning around bewildered, I saw that my pursuer was now immolated, and Sabitsuki was standing in between us, holding the flamethrower that once belonged to the incinerator. Its breathing gave way to low pitched screams of agony, the flames seeming to grapple with thin air until the creatures cloaking device fails, revealing the charred remains of some kind of mutated vortigaunt.

"Haven't seen a synthetic like that before."

I say, kneeling over it as Sabitsuki discards the now empty flamer.

"Quick thinking-how'd you get the incinerator to give up his tool?"

I ask before looking past her to see the incinerator in question dead on the floor from blunt-force trauma.

"Nice."


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3: Out of the city

(Subject: Sabitsuki [Surname redacted])

Alright, my memory, as I've stated before, isn't that great, but today I seem to have remembered that I have several phobias, such as darkness, open spaces, loud noises, and invisible alien assassins. Oh, and crowds.

Tetra told me she was taking me to a "safe zone" the resistance had managed to secure, and was using to get those to weak or important to fight out of the city. Other than the occasional overwatch patrol or small skirmish, we didn't run into many other people in the city. But once we got near the safe zone, I felt as though I could _feel_ the amount of people on the other side of the makeshift wall before we were through its scrap gate. And once we were across said threshold, I was practically assaulted with a wave of people. People running about, trying to find family members and carrying crates or weapons, crouched under makeshift tents and standing guard with fierce looking rifles on the walls, the sounds of gunfire distant, but still a definite presence in the audioscape. I even spied a few of those weird, brown things with the baleful red eyes that Tetra called Vortigaunts. the sheer number of people just freaked me out, made me all nerves and my hands couldn't stop shaking-I'm not sure if Tetra noticed, or didn't say anything as we made our way through the throngs of people.

"I had no idea that there was this many people with the resistance..."

"There aren't. These are just normal people trying to get out before the real fighting starts."

"But these are Combine citizens-wouldn't they've already been evacuated?"

"Please. The Combine cares about the human race only as far as they can work us."

Well, she certainly gets grumpy around the topic of the Combine. Makes sense, I guess. Suddenly, I lose my balance and a wall of people forms in between the two of us. I call out, but Tetra can't seem to hear me, and seems to be distracted talking to one of the resistance soldiers. Shit! And with that, I'm pretty much lost. In a crowd. Outside. In a war zone. Suddenly, my little apartment seems a lot nicer, with its isolation and its medicine. Oh no, medicine-I reach into my bra (this outfit doesn't exactly have pockets, like, at all) and clutch the small bottle of tablets I tucked away for safe keeping. I take them out and count them out-a single pill lasts two days before the symptoms start-Two a day would stop the nightmares, but that's never really been an option, the way they rationed it out to me, and now I have to make this last as long as possible until I can somehow find some other source of it. All in all, I've got enough here for two and a half weeks, three maybe. As I slip it back into its hiding place (Don't judge me) I'm knocked over once more.

"a thousand apologies, young one."

I hear a strange voice, like that of an impossibly old man, say, and smooth, three fingered hand helping me back up as I come face to face(?) with a vortigaunt.

"Oh, um...my bad."

I say, a little uncomfortable, but somehow, it doesn't feel half as bad in this crowd when I'm next to him (I think its a he). Next to his alien countenance, I look almost as if I belong in this crowd.

"You seem...lost, Sabitsuki."

He says simply, dusting me off.

"Wait a second-how do you know my name?"

"I'm afraid, young one, that I can't answer that at the moment. Suffice it to say, for now at least, that the Vortessence knows you well, and we serve the same mystery."

Alrighty then. That's...nice.

"Well-can you at least help me out? I came here with a girl named Tetra and we got separated."

"Ah, yes, the captains daughter. We know her as well, although for...different reasons. Come with me, and We'll see you together once more."

He says, gesturing for me to follow, and I do.

"What reasons, or can you not tell me that, either?"

I ask as we walk, curious to know more about my new-found friend.

"The captains daughter is a distinctive one. Like you, she was one of the "Miracle children" as the humans called them, born after the suppression fields were established by the combine, basically making human procreation next to impossible. Despite that, both of you were born, which is important enough to bear mention in the vortessence. But there is still more to her story. She's always wanted to be a warrior for the resistance, but her father-the Captain Odessa-would not allow it, having already lost his wife to the Combine. As a compromise between the two, she became a messenger for the rebels hiding within the boundaries of city 17. her agility was far above that of a normal human, and served her well in her endeavors, leaping dexterously across rooftops and, as the human expression goes, 'right under the Combines noses.'"

He stopped talking momentarily, as a Hodge-lodge seeming helicopter contraption takes off nearby, zooming above us and out of the city.

"Ah, the evacuation progresses. Very fortuitous that it could begin so soon. But as I was saying, your companion, Tetra-she shows capabilities and potential far above that of a normal human. Much like the Freeman, and much like yourself."

The Freeman? Was he talking about that Scientist Tetra idolized? Before I could ask him, he was gone, and Tetra was in front of me.

"Where'd you go? I was getting worried."

She says, rushing up to me.

"I'm sorry, I just tripped and got lost"

I say, blushing at my clumsiness, then even more when I feel her hand brush up against mine, though only for an instant before reverting to my original hue.

"That's okay-I was distracted talking to someone, anyways. Just take my hand and it won't happen again, alright?"

She says, smiling earnestly.

"Now lets get the fuck out-I secured us a vehicle. Being Odessa's daughter isn't all that bad."

She leads me into a large garage, with many piecemeal vehicles. She helps me get into a small, lightweight craft she refers to as a "jeep" and then gets into the drivers seat next to me.

"We'll leave with the next convoy in about 10 minutes, so catch a little breather for now."

She instructs me, and I lean back in my seat, throwing an arm over my eyes in exasperation at what I'd gone through-and it wasn't even noon. But after a few moments, my curiosity gets the better of me.

"Hey Tetra? I was talking to a vortigaunt earlier when I got separated. from you-he mentioned something called the "vortessence" or whatever. What is that, exactly?"

I ask, turning over to look at her, hunched in anticipation over the wheel.

"The vortessence...to tell the truth, I don't really know. Only the vortigaunts know the long and whole of it-most other species lack the sensory organs to even sense it, hence the name. But I can at least grasp the rudiments of it. Its sort of a great big mind that each living thing shares. There's the individual mind, which is formed of the individuals experiences and perceptions, but there is an experience of particular importance to many different life forms simultaneously-whether it be an event, a legend, a person, etc.-it becomes apart of the vortessence. Nearly every being can contribute to the vortessence-except, I hear, for barnacles-but only vortigaunts can access it, sort of like an Akashic memory. Other than that, it seems to be some kind of literal life-force that flows through all creatures-barnacles notwithstanding-but I personally think the two concepts are a different thing, and the vortigaunts just keep using vortessence for both out of convenience."

She explains, talking a little slowly, but I managed to soak the information pretty well, what little I now know confounding me further.

"Looks like its time to skedaddle. Convoy's leaving."

She says, revving the engine before I can inquire as the what the hell a _skedaddle_ is supposed to be. Driving in a car is, like most things, a new experience to me, yet oddly familiar. The feeling of motion at such speeds is nearly sickening, and Tetras driving is...daring, to put it politely. Not ten minutes would go by, its seemed. Without her endangering someones life. We were traveling with a pretty large convoy-it consisted of 6 or so buses filled to the brim with supplies and evacuees, several gyrocopters and heavily modified cropdusters for air support, and countless small buggies running guard duty. Figuring it was best to let Tetra concentrate, lest she be the end of us all, I spent much of my time staring silently at the windows, taking in the landscape as we passed. I must have seem so wide-eyed, seeing as this was my first time outside the city, but it wasn't that impressive. Mostly just marshy flatlands crisscrossed by shallow rivers we'd ford through on occasion, sending surprised gushes of water up the sides of our vehicle, momentarily transforming them into the stained glass of a monastery when the sunbeams hit the moist glass of the windows. Before I knew it, I drifted into a soft nap, which was nice, seeing as I had no dreams. Because of the pleasant-or, better still, lack of-content of my latest dreams, I was begin to think that maybe this life-long fever of mine was subsiding. But with a jolt I was awakened, not paying it to much mind and chalking it up to Tetra's 'defensive' driving. But then there was another, and another, and I opened my eyes. Tetra was breaking a sweat, and there was fire all around us as we drove, a deafening hum splitting the air. I looked up, and saw birds of death, combine choppers pursuing us with ample supplies of bombs and machine gun fire. All of a sudden, her haphazard movements became a boon as we swerved around fresh craters. The battle was evenly matched, however, for once they got there wits about themselves, resistance soldiers climbed nimbly to the tops of the buses, manning 50. caliber machine guns and giving as good as they got to their skybound adversaries, and it wasn't long before many of the crafts above us joined their own bombs in smoking holes. Tetra did her best to keep us safe, but ahead of us, the situation quickly escalated. Something was thrown from one of the remaining helicopters, but not a bomb-yet another monster. It was some kind of three limbed, insectile thing, and it landed atop one of the refugee buses, quickly killing the machine gun crew and begin to tear open the roof to get at the squealing refugees inside.

"Sabitsuki, can you drive?"

She asks, casting quick glances at me, then back out the windshield.

"No, of course no-"

"Turn the wheel the way you want to go, and press this to go-Stay alive until I come back!"

She orders, bringing us up to the side of the bus, as an unfortunate man is tossed out by the rampaging monster, reaching down from the rooftop to pluck them as though they were troublesome weeds. Without warning, she jumped out her window, latching onto the side before scrambling up the side, then standing tall-well, as tall as she could-in the face of the insect, firing her revolver into the air to get its attention, its eyeless, carapaced head swinging around to regard her, a low growl reverberating from somewhere within it. She fired several times at it, most of her bullets simply getting lodged in chitin, but at least a few making connection with its frail joints as it charged her. As her hammer clicked on an empty chamber, she slid the gun back to its holster and took the two axes at her back-one, a beat up hatchet, but the other a gleaming carbon fiber tomahawk-and ran towards to beast, leaping over it at the last second, angling herself to plant both blades in the creatures back, and it let out a wail, only enraged. But as it turned around, Tetra was already making her way to the machine gun mounted on the end of the bus, swinging it around to bear down on her adversary. I imagine she said some kind of catchphrase she found badass (Oh, by the way, I hadn't crashed yet! Driving was easier than I thought!) before open fire, the sustained hail of lead tearing apart the creature until it was a broken shell falling limply from the backside of the bus. She acrobatically maneuvered her way back to our car, landing on the roof and crawling back through the still open window.

"Thanks-had to help them somehow."

She said, one hand on the wheel and one hand on a spreading pool of red on the side of her torso. The critter must've struck her somehow in the fracas.

"That looks pretty bad..."

I say gesturing to the wound.

"Looks like we're far enough for the Combine to recognize its a lost cause. Why don't you pull over and I can at least get a bandage on you."

"So your a medic all of the sudden?"

"I have a passing knowledge of how to handle injuries like that. You pick up a lot of skills when you spend your time in the same room for years."

"Its just a flesh wound. We've got to keep up."

"We both know its worse than that. Come on, we can just catch up."

She sighs, and then reaches for the transceiver that's been wired into the dashboard.

"Big Bird, this is C1. We're going to stop off for a bit to take care of somethings, then regroup with you further along the route, at the canyon."

a gravely female voice replies in affirmation, and we break off from the pack.

"There's some first-aid kits and whatnot in the back, next to the food."

She grunts, her pain starting to becoming glaringly apparent.

I reach back, and there's more than enough to deal with the wound, which appears to be shallower than I first thought, once I get a good look at it.

"Um, you'll have to rem-"

But before I even begin speaking, she's out of her canvas coat and struggling out of her T-shirt

"I've been worked on before, Sabitsuki..."

She says, without a hint of embarrassment, although I'm about as red as a beet at the moment. Quickly, I begin to work on closing and treating the wound, my discomfort only magnified by the fact that Tetra was totally alright with this. She seemed quite unshakeable-she's kept her composure through the city, the sewers, the convoy, it makes sense that the awkwardness of discarding her shirt wouldn't weigh heavily on her mind. In what seems like an eternity, I finish bandaging the wound and she puts her clothing back on, starting our vehicle once more and jetting off.

"Thanks-feels better already."

She says, patting the gauze. I just nod and say an inarticulate syllable. It occurs to me that its a little strange that I would have this much of a reaction to her just taking her shirt off, but I shrug it off.

We drive in solitude for several hours as the evening continues on. Tetra claims she knew a shortcut, that would ensure that we catch up with them well in time, but apparently, someone thought that it would be a splendid time for a great deluge right about now, and it wasn't long before it was such a downpour that we had trouble seeing even five feet in front of our vehicle.

"Well, I guess we'll have to stop here."

She says, pulling under a small overhang in a cliff above us, angrily putting the jeep in park.

"Goddamn Combine, fucking up our climate, even. It doesn't rain for months at a time, and then we get it all at once, it seems like."

She grumbles before looking over and noticing I'm shivering.

"Oh! You must be terribly cold-I thought that might happen, so I grabbed some warmer clothes for you back at the safe zone. Here-"

She says, reaching back and presenting me with a blueish jacket and gray cargo pants.

"put these on. I'll step out so you can change."

"Oh, you don't need to do that."

"Its alright, Sabitsuki. Just knock on the window when your done. I've got to put some more fuel in the tank, anyways."

She smiles at me before hopping outside and setting about maintaining the vehicle. Quickly, I put the coat on over my tank top and slip the pants on under my skirt, before rapping on the door to let her back in.

"See? Wasn't that bad. Now where both warm-and then I've got this."

She says, reaching in the back seat yet once more and spreading a thick, tattered quilt over us. After that, theres a few minutes of silence as we both just relax a little, the pattering of the rain soothing our stress in a monotone fashion. I make some conversation with her about the day, complementing her heroics during the convoy, and she praising my ingenuity in the hospital once more. She seems preoccupied with the hospital, for some reason, and couldn't stop thinking about what was there, and why the combine felt the need to destroy it. But our conversation was short, for we were both quite tired. She feel asleep first, but her limp form somehow slid over and ended up leaning against me, her head resting on my shoulder. For some reason, I felt different around her than other people. I was sill nervous, but it wasn't the terrifying, shaky nervous I often got, but rather a nice, almost exciting but oddly calming sensation all over my body, and it intensified when she touched me. Unconsciously, I wrapped my arms around Tetra, falling asleep next to her.


End file.
